"Pressure Grows on Armenia" as Call for Liberation of Azerbaijani Provinces Becomes Second Most Popular White House Petition in History

BAKU, Azerbaijan, January 10, 2017 /PRNewswire/ --

The success of a White House petition last year, calling on the Obama administration "to assist in the liberation of the Azerbaijani provinces occupied by Armenia" has put Armenia under increasing pressure due to the level of awareness it raised, according to Elkhan Suleymanov, the President of the Association for Civil Society Development in Azerbaijan, who initiated the petition.

"'We the People' is a serious platform established by the Obama administration in 2011 and the White House response to our petition was real political support to Azerbaijan," said Suleymanov.

The petition on "Establishing Justice and Preventing a Great Catastrophe" calls for the immediate withdrawal of Armenian armed forces from the occupied territory of Nagorno-Karabakh and surrounding provinces and to assist in the prevention of a humanitarian catastrophe in the region because of the dangers posed by the neglected Sarsang dam, which is located in the Armenian-occupied territory.

According to the U.S.-based Pew Research Center, this petition has become the second most popular in the history of the platform, receiving more than triple the signatures needed to secure a reply by the Obama administration.

In its response in June last year, the White House stressed the importance of "the return of the territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh to Azerbaijan's control" and urged Armenia and Azerbaijan "to demonstrate restraint and enter into an immediate negotiation on a comprehensive settlement," which would include "a determination on Nagorno-Karabakh's status."

The petition was submitted in the wake of Resolution 2085 adopted last year by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), which accused Armenia of "environmental aggression and "deliberately depriving" Azerbaijanis of water flowing from the Sarsang reservoir. It also called for "the immediate withdrawal of Armenian armed forces from the region concerned."

"We had important victories last year," Suleymanov said, adding that sadly Armenia has not reacted to these demands and instead "creates confusion in the international community by presenting itself as a conflict party rather than an aggressor."

In addition to PACE, the UN, European Parliament and OSCE have all called for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Armenian troops from the Azerbaijani territories.

"It is critical that we continue to raise this issue, keep up international pressure and achieve the imposition of sanctions on Armenia," Suleymanov said.